This section is intended to provide a background or context to the invention that is recited in the claims. The description herein may include concepts that could be pursued, but are not necessarily ones that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, what is described in this section is not prior art to the description and claims in this application and is not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Certain abbreviations that may be found in the description and/or in the Figures are herewith defined as follows:
CA Carrier Aggregation
CAC Composite Available Capacity
CIO Cell Individual Offset
DC dual connectivity
ID Identification
I/F Interface
eNB Evolved nodeB
EPC Evolved Packet Core
gNB Next generation NB (5G NB)
LTE Long Term Evolution
MME Mobility Management Entity (part of LTE EPC)
MPS Multimedia Priority Service
MVNO Mobile Virtual Network Operator
NCE Network Control Element
NR New Radio (5G RAT)
N/W Network
PDCP Packet Data Convergence Protocol (protocol layer)
QoS Quality of Service
RAN Radio Access Network
RAT Radio Access Technology
RSU Resource Status Update
SCTP Stream Control Transmission Protocol
UE User Equipment
Next-generation 5G networks and future communication technology networks are designed to enable unsurpassed mobile and connected communications. Still, there has been much effort to improve latency, throughput, capacity, and availability of these communication technologies. In the advancement of these communication technologies there is seen to be a shift from the current network of entities architecture to a network of capabilities architecture. Network slicing offers one effective way to meet the requirements of all use cases using a common network infrastructure.
The example embodiments of the invention as disclosed herein work to improve network slicing procedures and operations in communication networks.